Hello,
Many of us on here have lost our loved one as a result of mistakes made in their health or social care. For me, it was my dad’s symptom of ischemic heart disease being misdiagnosed by the non-medically qualified healthcare worker he was given appointments with in primary care, culminating in a cardiac arrest.
I am now adamant that lessons need to be learned, to avoid this happening to anyone else. I’ve approached no-win no-fee solicitors, but the first two have declined to take the case. I also intend on contacting Just Treatment, my dad’s MP, and the Health Services Safety Investigations Body (HSSIB). That is a lot of work. Plus, my mum was also recently failed by her primary care centre (a different one to my dad’s!) when they didn’t follow NICE guidelines, and mistreated her hypertension, leading to referral to same day emergency care at the hospital for a hypertensive emergency.
Wouldn’t it be better if we could just thrash it out, with the people and institutions who caused the harm? Wouldn’t direct communication help? I know that that’s what PALS aims to do, but in primary care I can’t even access my dad’s notes yet, because I don’t yet have the grant of probate (whereas, the hospital was happy to accept my application for probate as proof, and they released the notes). To me it seems as though primary care causes most of the problems, and is the least co-operative.
Well, if you feel strongly like me, that we should not have to go through all of this, on top of the collosal and unjust loss we’ve already faced, 2 organisations that support patients and family who’ve been harmed as a result of negligence, have come together to propose a better way, and they’d like to hear from you.
Link to the consultation document in PDF form
https://www.avma.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/The-Harmed-Patient-Pathway-–-A-consultation-document-issued-by-AvMA-and-Harmed-Patients-Alliance.pdf
Link to the feedback form
www.avma.org.uk/hppconsultation
I’ll be commenting. Maybe you’d like to, as well.